本书作为英语专业基础阶段的阅读教材旨在扩大学生的词汇量,增强英语语感,丰富文化知识,提高人文素质,并培养学生的逻辑思维和形象思维能力,训练略读、寻读、细读、评读等阅读技巧。为满足扩充词汇量、拓展知识百的需要,本书选题范围较广,内容丰富;为提高学生的思辩能力和阅读欣赏能力,优先选择具有经典意义和收藏价值的文章,有助于学生从西方传统文化和现当代文化中肖取精华部分,了解其独特的精神内涵。配套练习旨在引导学生去解读、思考、分析、批评,并激发学生更强烈的阅读欲望。

Unit One Tranditional Chinese Culture
Text A The Language of Painting
Text B Limitless Energy
Unit Two Campus Life
Text A Take This Fish and Look at It
Text B Another School Year--What For?
Unit Three Career
Text A Your Flexible Friends
Text B Words That Get You Hired
Unit Four Economy
Text A The Decoupling Debate
Text B Three Bears That Ate Goldilocks Economy
Unit Five The Familiar Essay(I)
Text A Solve That Problem--With Humor
Text B The Crooked Streets
Unit Six Gender
Text A When Bright Girls Decide That Math Is "a Waste of Time
Text B Escaping the Daily Grind for Life as a House Father
Unit Seven Education
Text A A Matter of Degrees
Text B How to Build a Student for the 21 st Century
Unit Eight Emotional Life
Text A Friendship: The Laws of Attraction
Text B When to Choose Is to Lose
Unit Nine Science
Text A The Biggest Extinction on Earth
Text B Why Women Live Longer than Men?
Unit Ten The Familiar Essay(II)
Text A Fame
Text B The Vice of Punctuality
Unit Eleven Short Story
Text A The Shocks of Doom
Text B Luck
Unit Twelve Environment Protection
Text A The Price of Oil
Text B Eco Fashion? A World Consumed by Guilt